- Will Samsung's speaker have Bixby?

- Either way, Bixby is adding Spotify support

A couple years after Amazon launched the Amazon Echo, and a year after Google launched the Google Home, and months after Apple announced the HomePod, Samsung has announced it is developing a smart speaker, too. DJ Koh, president of Samsung’s mobile division, revealed the news to CNBC after Samsung's Unpacked/Galaxy Note 8 event. He also confirmed the product would launch "soon".

We've heard before that Samsung is working on a Bixby-powered smart speaker, but for the first time, it's official. Mind you, Samsung announced earlier on Wednesday, while on stage at its Unpacked event, that users of Bixby can soon use voice control to play music through Spotify. It's a major win for Bixby, as the assistant has suffered from multiple delays and a lack of integrations lately.

Bixby is Samsung's answer to Google Assistant and Amazon Alexa. It's now available in over 200 countries. We think making a smart speaker to showcase Bixby seems like the logical next step for Samsung. Koh said Samsung wants to create a "fruitful user experience at home with Samsung devices, and [he] want[s] to be moving quite heavily on it."

But, technically, he didn't specify whether Samsung's speaker will feature Bixby. It's pretty much a safe bet, though one can never assume. That being said, Bixby is coming to connected Samsung wearables and other Samsung devices. So why not a smart speaker?